Belle Aire (for Mandolin Orchestra)

Back in 2002 I began to write my own light airy flute and guitar arrangement of the Ukrainian New Year's carol "Щедрик", or Carol of the Bells as we know it these days, as a gift for my wife. I got part-way into writing it and morphing it into a 4/4 trance tune (of all things), then set it aside and wrote a "Baroque/Bach" version of the carol instead ( "Belle Fugue" http://www.macjams.com/song/18042 ). So the "Belle Aire" sketch gathered dust for years...

until...

in November 2011 I met a local mandolin player (Kevin), who told me the "San Diego Mandolin Orchestra" group he was playing in ( http://www.myspace.com/sandiegomandolinorchestra ) had a Christmas concert coming up and they might be looking for new music for Mandolins and flute. This seemed like a fun opportunity to re-orchestrate something, learn about a new instrument (the mandolin), and possibly have a piece of my music performed live!

But I only had a few weeks to come up with something. I remembered this very short (half-completed) "holiday" piece from almost a decade ago, and started researching the mandolin. Oh wait... it is an ORCHESTRA, a whole FAMILY of instruments! Mandolin, Mandola, Octave-Mandolin, Mandolin-cello... I learned as much as I could about each instrument and its range and what clef each played in, then started reworking the music for these instruments. The flute's deceptive initial counter-melody (that makes the listener start wondering if this might not be Carol of the Bells at all) was already there and remained intact, but I added some embellishments, like adding a short swing-section, bouncing the melody between guitars and mandolins in the middle, and putting in some of the characteristic mandolin tremolos near the end.

Well, to make a long story short, Jim Trepasso, conductor of the orchestra very kindly accepted my score, and had his musicians start practicing it for the performance. On December 21st, 2011, my wife and I drove down to attend the concert, at the Coronado Public Library ( http://www.coronado.lib.ca.us ) . We offered to video-tape this and a few of the (more traditional) holiday pieces they played that evening, to give more exposure to the mandolin orchestra, and to the "Friends of the Coronado Library" who put on these concerts. The orchestra did an amazing job quickly learning and performing my piece for the concert, and the evening was a jam-packed success. Jim was embarrassingly generous with his introduction of me during the concert.

So, without further ado, here is a video recording of the San Diego Mandolin Orchestra performing "Belle Aire". And the Macjams audio recording here is the Garageband computerized rendition of the musical score itself (not the live performance) for comparison.

If the above video does not show up, just click/copy the following link to watch it on YouTube here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMDCyKF0-Dc

Please visit the San Diego Mandolin Orchestra web site, buy some of their music, and go to your local library and support their concerts! Happy holidays, and may you have a bountiful new year!

My warmest thanks to Jim Trepasso for offering to have my music performed, to the Mandolin Orchestra musicians for practicing and performing so nicely, to Vanessa the flute player/Coronado librarian who helped set up the concert and played the flute part with such warmth, and to my wife who was half of our video-camera/roadie team, and always inspires me beyond words.

Belle Aire (for Mandolin Orchestra)
Impressive piece and arrangement! And I'm very impressed with your willingness to study up and get familiar with the parameters of the ensemble you were writing for. And a big congratulations for getting your piece preformed.

Glad you enjoyed it!
Thank you Andrew... you are doubly-talented and can write your own music AND play it... I must ask others to play mine for me :-) So this was very exciting for me! I just had to share!

fun feedback
Thank you Kristine, yes, it was exhilarating actually! And quite a few of them said they really liked the arrangement too (although, perhaps it was simply a welcome break from Jingle Bells and Rudolf?) And some complained that it was too short, which (for music) I took as a compliment too :-) Thank you for stopping in and watching the performance, I always appreciate your thoughts and support!

This is special
I couldnt even begin to put somethinlg like this together... I can imagine you waiting for the curtain to rise and then you're actual recording the event... wow.
This song was the first song that I actually listened too on our smart-allecky ipad that we got for Christmas... and I thought I was only getting the hot water heater... so it was a big surprise....

Roadie duty
Andy, you should know that my wife and I were so busy before the performance stringing mic cables, swapping out almost dead camera batteries, setting up tripods, etc. that we had no time to get exci... aw heck, you're right, not only was I excited all through this, but I think my wife was even more proud and happy than myself! She made me burn a DVD copy of the movie so she could take it over on Christmas eve to show her dad and brothers :-)

Congratulations on getting one of those iPad thingies, much more fun than a water heater. I'm all blushy having you watch this on it, thank you!

Hot Curry time
Merry Christmas to you to, Johannes. This was a treat, and an excellent learning experience... not just in scoring correctly for many different strings, but also pushing me to learn some new aspects of my notation software (for example, how to display multi-bar rests, and how to format and print individual parts from the giant score... etc.) So much fun stuff out there to keep learning about! And I have now met a whole bunch of new wonderful people too!

no small feat for small hands
Hey Coop, haven't seen you around for awhile (oh, just read of your no-backup-crash-casualty, ouch.)

I appreciate you stopping in to check this out... an exciting step forward for me indeed. And as you eloquently point out, I am indeed having fun learning things each day... life's too short to sit around and die. OK (rubs his hands together)... what shall I accomplish tomorrow?

Not exactly proud
But a DEFINITE feeling of accomplishment and excitement, and gratitude toward the conductor and musicians (who are all about to all get little thank-you treat from me.) And of course it drives me to try more fun things! Well, maybe not sky-diving.

I am so happy for you
"Up-and-coming-young-composer", and man of very many other talents, besides being an all-'round nice guy who owes me a dinner (or a lunch, I'm not greedy). It must have been an enormous thrill, after all that work of learning about, and scoring for, a range of "new" instruments, to actually have it performed in front of an audience.
Well done, bravo, and good on ya, buddy! (Sorry, no puns, just the straight goods ;-)

Or cinnamon french toast BREAKFAST
Oh wait, I invited you over this Summer for breakfast, and you were busy :-) Well, that and it was several thousand miles to travel for breakfast. But my offer is always open for you... maybe next year (which is REALLY soon now!)

We had a blast at the concert, and the place was packed. Such fun! Thank you for enjoying the performance with me!

Belle Aire
many congratulations on this eduard - how incredibly exciting for you! "up and coming YOUNG composer"?????? well, the first half of that sentence is spot on! what a wonderful project, realized in this totally cool way - YAY!!

Congratulations Eduard
I know you have been looking forward to that moment when your music would be played to a live audience. I am happy that time has come now. It IS a very special moment when something like this happens, more REAL than posting on the internet, however nice that can be ;-)

I have no idea what amount of work goes into arranging music like this, or how much of it is the original melody and how much you have added. But to me it does seem to be a LOT! But it is difficult to know since arrangements seldom get a lot of credit (do they?).

I need to listen again on decent speakers but I really think you have done a great job here. Way to go. Next time you will have written something ALL your own for them to play, won't you ;-)

just hum a little melody
I think you could probably say that other than "humming the melody" in places, that probably 90 percent of the music, harmonies, and little extra bits are all mine. I invented everything around the melody. However, given this very exciting help from the conductor and orchestra, oh yes, I do have another completely original piece I want to re-orchestrate for them (even though that may seem a little "Quixotic" of me... uh, that is a hint about the name of the next piece :-) There are many variations on "Carol of the Bells", you can find many on the net, and quite a few of them here on Macjams even (I usually "Favorite" the ones I see go by.)

So yes, it is a very special moment, and I look forward to going out and making a lot more special moments... they're great fun. And we wish you and yours lots of special wonderful moments in 2012 too. Thank you as always, Henrik for listening and writing to me, I always appreciate your thoughts.

Definitely weeks of excitement!
This has been so much fun... traveling to listen to early rehearsals, meeting the orchestra members and conductor, learning a whole lot more about orchestration, guitars, mandolins, and then hearing the final result... still gives me goosebumps! And I am also very happy to have captured it on video, not only to share it with you (welcome back!) and other Macjammers, but also to help promote the orchestra too! What a great bunch of people. Thank you for listening and appreciating... I knew you would, being such a great arranger yourself!

Wow!
This is such an accomplishment. Like the others, I got a real kick out of the "Up and coming YOUNG composer" line, but for sure you are stretching your boundaries, just like a youngster. I think you are a real talented guy on so many fronts from the arts to technology and this is yet another validation of that . I have to ask, how did you transpose the music? I know you can get a score out of Logic, but I am sure that you had to do some finagling to put music in front of each musician.
I am also impressed at the effort to learn the range and characteristic of each instrument. Very well done.

Always stretching & learning
There are soooo many things to learn in life, I cannot imagine anyone ever being bored. Photography, shooting videos, hiking, reading, roasting coffee, composing, composting, computer programming, sheesh, the list is endless! So my wife looked at me with the squinty eyes, and said, "OK, next on your list is to tackle the next step in music that you've been avoiding... the development section!" I need to work on that weak spot now!

As for transposition, I write all my music in a music notation program that makes it fairly easy to have multiple staves with each staff properly keyed/transposed and in the right clef (it is like Sibelius or Finale in that regard.) So I did the transposition as I was changing it for each type of instrument. Then I had to quickly learn how to tell my music software to print a separate PDF file for each part, and viola de mandola! Now I need to look for a good place to sell my sheet music... since this was a LOT of work! Thank you as always for your encouragement and help and your own inspiring music!

interplay was fun
That was fun to write in, and I'm happy to hear that you liked that too. I've been learning a whole bunch lately... and am having a blast being able to share it too! Thank you for listening, and sharing your sweetly honed music as well.

Vic
It was a thrill to hear, and has taught me all sorts of things... I've been attentively taking notes (semi-intentional pun) through the whole process, and have learned a great deal more about the mechanics and aesthetics of orchestrating... mostly learned that I still have so much to learn! :-) Several of the musicians have mentioned having fun with it to me, yes. Good fun! Thank you for checking this out, and your unwavering support and help.

Pretty
...darn good show! And pretty and delicate listening too! I love the sound of a mandolin orchestra (Simon Mayor particularly), impressive arrangement and very well done to have this publicly performed.

new experience and sound for me!
Ooh, so glad you came by and liked the sound and arrangement... and I'm off to find "Simon Mayor" now, thank you! ... Ah, he's quite an impressive and prolific guy! Funny, we had a wonderful mandolin player here on MJ for awhile too, called "Mandolinquent" (http://www.macjams.com/artist/mandolinquent).

If
you are not "slightly" pushing the buttons of your shirt due to a slightly swelled chest than you sir are no Dragon (and of course you Are a Dragon)
Love the studio track and totally enjoyed the vid Eduard. Fantastic stuff.

who's got the buttons?
I never let buttons get in the way of running off to create more stuff and meet more friends! But then, Mr. Big, you know a bit about that too, after all. Thank you for listening to both renditions, always happy to have your ear, eye, and thoughts on my progress!

Tres Bon...
...but I am confused...oh I see, play the fillum and see the people play the arrangement of what you have also done electronically and midilly ...is that about right ? Cool and interesting as I also abuse one of those little fellers. A mandolin is what we are talking about here ....okay ! And so is this addition to the MacJams archives....off to find the SDMO now see you later.......

midily midily, down the stream
Yes, the idea was to convert an idea of music into computer music, then convert computer music to paper music, then have real people convert paper music into REAL music... and "presto mando poof!" There we are! Yes, you are one of those talented fellers who can actually coax music out of a wooden box! Thank you for stopping in, Chris!

The feeling is mutual...
And because playing blues (on anything) is way out of reach for me, I enjoy listening to musicians like yourself! I am happy you stopped by and listened and commented on something different, thank you.

Inspiring
Seeing and hearing what you have accomplished will fortify me when my own inspiration flags. I know very little about this type of music, but having read your piece above and the other comments, I can tell you my musical world has suddenly opened up!

opening doors and minds...
You know, this is what happened to me by hanging out with other Macjams artists here too! When I started writing my own music years ago, I never thought that I would hear it come out of anything but my computer... so this has been very exciting and educational. I think you too will find energy and excitement here. I certainly enjoyed your first musical offering here ("Heart".)

DAVE! Good to hear from you again!
Hope life is treating you well. Thank you for watching and enjoying this. This has been a great way to suddenly learn a lot more about orchestration, laying mic cables so children don't trip on them or chew on them, Final Cut speed-editing tricks, and how to stand still in the back of a crowded room pinned behind a tripod for an hour without getting leg cramps. :-)

Vic "Cool" Holman...
So you got into this... excellent! The payoff of experiencing the performance was well worth all the work that went into putting it all together. Thank you for stopping by to see and hear the performance, and letting me know you liked the arrangement!

Belle
the first thing that hits me with your recordings is always the ambiance. always that cozy room feel. do you use a convolution IR ambiance? if so, what (small room, NY studio, hall, etc)? very intricate and detailed use of midi. that's always admirable to me. do you play most parts on keyboard first, then maybe a little editing?

The good, bad, and the nerdy...
Thank you for listening so attentively, and picking up on some of the details I sweat over on these. Yes, convolution/matrix reverb is a wonderful thing to add (carefully) to warm up a recording, and something that it has taken me some time to get to sound right. I am now leaning more toward a "Medium Hall" sized reverb for my classical stuff, and (depending on the density of the tracks) between 10% and 25% wet mix.

The MIDI, I always go in afterward and tweak volume curves over different notes, and go back and do major "articulation surgery" to handle staccato/legato notes differently, etc (I am still using the Apple Symphony Jampack, so my instruments and articulations are pretty limited.)

And sadly, I haven't ever learned to play piano keyboard, so my note-input method is excruciatingly slow... dragging a note at a time onto the staves. That's why I don't create very much music. There's a bunch of it waiting in my brain, but getting it onto paper is a little slow and time-consuming... that and my full-time job always gets in the way :-)

Glad you enjoyed the final result, and I appreciate you being interested in my technical process!
ttfn,
Drakonis

Bravo Bravo Bravisssssssssiomo!
I really like how you were able to bring forth the different tonalities of the various sizes of instruments as they took on phrases that danced together to form the recognised melody, and cleverly used a flute to contrast the plucked attack of the mandolins. The MP3 was quite amazing; I can almost smell the sweat you put into the hand crafting of the notes. It must be like Nick Park making a Wallace and Grommit stop action film - lots of fiddly bits that most of us would miss but for the perfection of the finished product. MIDI nerds with pencil tools rule.

I'm completely blown away by the intimate sound you achieved, and moreover, technical wizardry aside, it's a most pleasant and interesting composition. The passage at 0:36 is almost jazzy and reminds me of an old Claude Bollling recording I have, especially between the flute and the walking bass. In other places I get a baroque feel. Very cool.

If I were to offer one nit (you are REALLY making me work for this one - lighten up next time :) ) I think the reverb in the sound stage dies out a little too quickly at the end. Not really too constructive, I'll admit. Seriously, this is freaking awesome. None of this 'up and coming' composer stuff in my mind - the talented composer is ALREADY in the building!!

Doug

Now when do we get to hear the trance version? Maybe a Drak/Diviner collab .... ?

Finally, congrats on getting your piece performed. It must feel great. Well deserved!

To have caught your ear and attention... Doug...
This excites me a great deal, to get such generous and loquacious thoughts and praise from you. Oh, where to start?
-I was very happy to know a flute player was part of the ensemble, because the original piece had the flute line, and as you say, the slow-attack of the flute couples nicely over the plucked instruments, so I could keep that here.
-I did orchestrate it to have the lower mandolas and guitars, then the higher mandolins, sort of take turns and peek through in waves. The section in the middle where I break the melody up across mandolin 1, 2, and guitars is very fun to watch live, sort of like a melodic ping-pong match. Some musicians really liked that (as did the conductor), and others were not so enamored of the counting-in.
-Wallace and Gromit? I think my wife and I have ALL the W&G DVDs, love the story lines and as you say, the incredible detail and craftsmanship.
-I bought and pretty much wore out the LP of Claude Bolling's suite for flute and jazz piano as a kid (and now have the CD), so there's uh, probably some not-so-subliminal influence there (as well as Bach.) So you are picking up the vibes loud and clear :-)
-It is about time to get some constructive criticism! OK, boost the reverb slightly, or at least boost the tail at the end, OK, good idea.
-The original version of this (that has a trance snippet in it) will likely never be heard, because it is pretty rough, but Diviner could probably completely run with it and make it worthwhile... hmmm...
-To publish the score as beautifully laid out sheet music parts, I used the same software that I write all my music in, "Harmony Assistant", which is a shareware program for Mac/Windows, and rivals Sibelius or Finale for features (but is a lot cheaper.) I shall have to do a "VodCast" (video-expose) of how I go from music to MP3 sometime, if people are interested.

so very cool
what an incredible gift for you and for us! I can only imagine the thrill of actually standing in front of a group that is playing something I wrote. congrats to you for putting yourself out there and making/letting this happen. this is wonderful eduard.

quite a payoff!
This has been lots of work, but lots of fun along the way too, as I have been learning so much... which is my favorite thing to do. And getting to hear it performed, and share it with everyone has been an indescribable thrill. So I am making some thank-you gifts for the conductor and the orchestra musicians now :-) BTW, there's this really beautiful CD of music that I often play in the car to work... and so, whether you know it or not, your hard work now has YOU playing your music for me, so thank you again! :-)
ttfn,
Drakonis

Guitar orchestras
are quite rare, so i was pleasantly surprised when you introduced us to a Mandolin Orchestra.... this was so enjoyable especially after reading about all the ins and outs of how you got them to play the piece. It really does sound fine Eduard and thanks for the viewing also..... Best wishes to you and yours, M

Did you say Guitar Orchestra
It is funny because there is a Guitar Orchestra in my little town (one of my co-workers plays there), and I went to a recent concert... they are very good. And there are TWO Mandolin orchestras in San Diego now! I seem to have been under a rock until recently. Perhaps that means that there are more than you think... sort of like pixies... maybe there's one near you?

Glad you were interested in the technical bits behind the music. Thank you for listening and watching the video, I hope to do a little more of this after I catch my breath.
ttfn,
Drakonis

Holy Cow!
Eduard, this is one of the most impressive pieces I have ever heard of yours! A polished arrangement, nothing extraneous, simple but clever, and just a joy to hear! WOW! Awesome track, my friend!

almost ten years of polishing...
Clark, I am quite flattered by such praise from you. A joy to hear? Thank you, that gets me all excited to keep working on these things... I sincerely appreciate your injection of enthusiasm. Wheee, now where did I hide that spare time to go make more of these?

Really enjoyed the video too
Just watched the video and really enjoyed that too. I particularly liked hearing you described as "an up and coming young composer." It is both exciting and terrifying to have your music played in public by an ensemble, is it not? At least that's what I find...

learning in the hot seat...
Yes, it was terrifying to go to the first rehearsal, I was worried the musicians would "pick fights" with me for writing off the end of their fret-boards, but my research on instrument ranges seems to have paid off, and some even said they liked my arrangement... although after playing "Frosty" and "Jingle Bells" over and over, perhaps even my piece was welcome! :-) Interestingly, at the performance I was not just audience but camera roadie, so my mind was partly distracted with making sure I pushed all the right buttons during the performance. You saw the conductor had his video camera, and it wasn't working ("memory's full!"), so I was sweating about the video capture details. But it went well, and the audience liked it, and the conductor looks forward to using my score for future performances, yay! Now I'm looking at web reviews of various on-line sheet-music-publishing places. You never know.

Thank you for all your help, support, encouragement, friendship, humor, and wonderful music!

Belle Aire
Wow! What a great story! I would never have the guts to attempt what you did, and you accomplished the task nicely! This sounds very traditional and elegant, and you should be very proud! What a great gift for your wife as well.

traditional and elegant
Very nice praise, thank you! My wife has been giddy with excitement over this for weeks now, so it was perfect! Uh oh... I just realized that I have to think up something for next year now! :-)

This was quite an interesting experience, really stretched me in all sorts of directions. And I am still hiding in Garageband, haven't stretched into Logic yet, so you're a step ahead of me there!

living in the old world...
that's me, finding so much to listen to and learn about. Thank you for listening and offering your thoughts, especially that you thought it tasteful... a very important ingredient I try to work toward!
ttfn,
Drakonis

Counterpoint
Thought I am awfully late getting to this number, I am glad that I finally caught it. I am a sucker for clear counterpoint, and you have that going on (on many levels...ha!) in this number. There's a lot going on here, but it all makes good sense as you weave "ring Christmas bells" throughout the number...I really like everything you did with this, Eduard, and applaud you for getting live musicians together to pull off a good performance of your work.

very exciting
and I learned a LOT about composition, setting scores for different parts and formatting the printed scores, researching instrument ranges, going to rehearsals to hear the progress, then trying to video-tape and also enjoy the concert at the same time :-) I'm so glad it happened!
ttfn,
Drakonis

funny...
just a short while ago, I could say the same thing (i.e. "no idea how to even begin to organize this") but I keep learning such great things here. Thanks for stopping a spell and listening. I'm glad it tickles your fancy.
ttfn,
Drakonis

Ooh! Thanks!
I sincerely appreciate you stopping in to listen to my accomplishment here, and also for sharing the video out on Facebook... hopefully it will get the SDMO some more good exposure, they are a great bunch!
ttfn,
Drakonis

Eduard's musical interests span a variety of musical genres, including, classical, world, ambient, electronica, and rock and blues. His venture "SchwanSongs" is where he writes and publishes his own musical compositions, usually classically-based m... [see more]